Tuesday, September 27, 2011

In the town of Cooper's Dell, a pastor is getting a bad reputation in the local area for his very christian ways and three teenagers think they have hit the jackpot when they get asked to take part in a three way with a woman on the Internet.

Now for anyone who hasn't spent more than 10mins talking to me or hasn't been in my bedroom; I am a HUGE Kevin Smith fan. I love all his movies (yes even Jersey Girl and Cop Out), podcasts, books and comics. So it would mean that this film would need to be Cyrus level of terrible in order for me to not like it, fortunately that isn't the case and I loved it.

Performance wise is quality is quite varied. Michael Parks is fantastic. His borderline eccentric Paster Cooper is one of the strongest characters iv seen in a film in a while. John Goodman also bringing his a-game with a fantastic mix of good acting and just being funny. My favourite of the cast without a doubt Mr Babble-On himself: Ralph Garman. Although being the Silent Bob/Boba Fett character in that he is mute, he simply awesome. The three boys in the movie were also pretty good. However, i feel the need to say my honest opinion, in that i wasn't too blown away with Melissa Leo, she wasn't bad by any standards, just a little dwarfed in scenes by Park's awesome aura. There was also the girl who was in the final season of Scrubs, (Kerry Bishé if IMDB is to be believed) she was OK but some of her lines, i thought lacked proper delivery; a particular moment included a Harrison Ford "And i thought they smelt bad........on the outside" like pause in between her lines. But that's just me nit picking so i don't sound too biased when i say its the most beautifully made of all of Smith's movies. From Clerks to this, its clear he has matured as a director and although the View-Askew films are legendary, its sad that we will only get to see him make one more film with his current level of directing skills.

OK the story. I agree with something that Jeff Canata said on TRS's review and that it feels like 3 movies in one. It opens with a teen comedy and its a strong opening, but then it suddenly stops that and becomes a psychological horror movie, involving psycho Christians with Parks, then it flips again and becomes an action movie with Goodman, it continues down the action route until the end when it closes with the comedy. The ending is one of most funniest tedious endings ever. I'll not go into it for fear of spoilers, but the ending is really good.
A lot of other reviewers have stated that the plot doesn't flow and this isn't the case, its just it cant decide what genre it wants to be until half way into the film.

Monday, September 19, 2011

When a mole is thought to exist somewhere at the top of British secret service, a retired spy must come back to try and figure out who.

My first words after seeing this, were "that was the best film i'v seen that i didn't understand" I stand by that review.
With a cast overflowing with talent, its hard to knock the film, i just had no idea what was going on.
From Gary Oldman in the lead to a long list of thesps, including: John Hurt, Benedict Cumberbatch, Mark Strong, Tom Hardy, Colin Firth and Toby Jones, not one gave a less than perfect performance.
However the plot of the film lost me. I constantly forgot the names of charcters, not to spoil the ending but the motive behind the entire plot isn't explained, I was constantly confused as to what was a flashback and what was present. The other thing i noticed was whenever Gary Oldman looked at the camera with his sunglasses the DP cameoed as he was filming. Now the film might be a little slow and be a very "pay attention" kind of film, but even for its flaws, its still a good watch. Tom Hardy and Mark Strong's plot lines are particularly memorable and every time John Hurt pops up he's just awesome.

Recommend: Films fans only for this I think, not a casual watch.
Overall: 7/10

Saturday, September 17, 2011

First off, yes we did the whole 12hour experience, back to back. Second, I didn't take notes and don't intend on writing a lot on this, but still need to mention something. We wanted to do it for simple nerdy checklist reasons and I hadn't seen Return of the King since theatrical release.

First up: Fellowship Of The Ring. The most boring of the trilogy. Nothing happens until 'you shall not pass' and then its just waiting for Boromir and the end. Two Towers. It gets better. The battle for Helms Deep is one of my faves. All scenes with Treebeard and the ents are all good. The main problem with the first two movies that isn't in the third is all the depressing elf crap with Arwen or any time Frodo is being emo. Return Of The King. The best. Love the Andy Serkis opening of Smeagle. Love the battle for Minas Tirith, every bit of it. Love all the undead legion stuff. Didn't like the bits with Faramir until he meets Gandalf. Frodo is still all boring and emo all up to the end.

Most of the bits I noticed that are new seemed to have more of a comedic nature to them, some did add to the story, some didn't. Again I didn't want to do a detailed review, but normal service will be resumed next time.

Thursday, September 15, 2011

When a young girl's parents are killed right infront of her, she spends her life training for the day she takes down their killer.

A terrible movie, so a nice short review. Zoe Saldana was good, she got a nice charcter down and she was sexy to boot. But the entire story was boring, all the action scenes were nothing new and the film was just boring. When I watch movies, I do like to be enticed and be in the movie, but with this I found myself criticising most of the movie and laughing at terrible CGI....i think they were supposed to be sharks. In most films there is a certain amount of theatrical lisence, with technology and software that does things it cant do in real life, but some of the stuff they got going in this film was unbelieveable, including 4 taps on a keyboard which turn the PC on, launch all the survalliance cameras on all her screens and start playing the specific song she wants to play. MADNESS!

Saturday, September 3, 2011

With mysterious disappearances in the neighbourhood, two teenagers start to prepare themselves for if their neighbour is a Vampire.

Now I never saw the original of this so I'm only reviwing it as it is, without the word "remake". I liked it. The film is kinda split into two parts, the first part is a quirkey teen comedy and the other a thiller/horror, either way the film is good. Anton Yelchin in the lead role as Charlie. He was OK but his voice/accent can be very boring at times. He has a very throaty voice and sometimes was hard to pay attention to what he is saying. Colin Farrell plays the vampic neighbour in question and is fantastic. He has a great way of imbedding a sacrastic, kinda "modern" take on a vampire, but not being gay like Twilight (one nice stab at Twilight in the film was good). Most of the cast was in fact good, there weren't any poor performances throughout. Now i feel i have missed someone out in the cast list....oh yea DAVID TENNANT!!!!!! Fantastic. His drunken, cowardly Peter Vincent was a definate show stealer. Now some may argue that his character is just as eccentric and knowledgeable as his portrayal as The Doctor, but as #10 is my Doctor, i don't care, he was awesome. Not only do i hope he gets more big movie work from this, he has the best line in the entire film. Its clear from the trailer who and what his character is, and he has been using E-Bay to purchase his "tools". When he finally gets to use them and one malfunctions he simply yells "FUCKING E-BAY!!"
Love it!!
The story is pretty simple, it's really scary and doesn't have the suspence or the fear of the unknown. We know from the start who is who and what is happening, the entire film is a big build up to the ending, but it keeps your attention held and the ending was rather unique and rather genius in the art of vampiric killing.

Recommend: Definately, especially those who just more Tennant in their lives.
Overall: 8/10

Thursday, September 1, 2011

When a little boy who is a giant fanatic is given a magic
ticket into the movies he must help save the day with his favourite movie
character.

I really liked this movie. Another recommendation (this time
my friend Kent) and after I loved Tangled, I think my friends really understand
my movie tastes. Schwarzenegger gets a bad rep in my film collection as the
worst of all the Batman villains, but in this he is awesome. He plays the
action hero known as Jack Ryder, who is the lead in a series of movies based
around Die Hard meets Beverly Hills Cop meets The Terminator. Arnie is awesome
throughout the film and proves that he is best suited to action heroes than he
is a super-villain. Just as the title would suggest the film is filled with
action sequences, explosions and cheesy one liners. I loved the 4th
act of the film in which the characters go through to the “real world” and
there is a fantastic moment when the villain, Benedict played by Charles Dance,
who is fantastic as the sarcastic evil British genius (aren’t we all?), anyway
he is in the real world notices that not all crimes are given justice and
decides to try his look by murdering a man, only to shout out that he did it,
to no response from the law. My favourite scene in the entire film. Other
supporting cast to look out for include Danny DeVito as the voice of Jack’s
animated friend Whiskers the Cat and Sir Ian McKellen as death.

The film is funny, witty and full of action there is nothing
to not like. Except that it can be too cheesy in places, but for an 90’s movie
not that bad.

Recommend: Yes, and definitely worth a re-watch if you have seen it before.